FDA approves first non-invasive DNA test for colorectal cancer

By: Danielle Burgess · August 12, 2014 ·

Big news in the colorectal cancer prevention and screening community yesterday! In a never-before-seen move, the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) jointly proposed Cologuard as a new option for colorectal cancer screening. What is Cologuard? Cologuard, produced by Exact Sciences, is a non-invasive (not requiring insertion of instruments… Read More

Colorectal Cancer Is (or Could Be) the Poster Child for Cancer Prevention

February is Cancer Prevention Month, and colorectal cancer (CRC) is a poster child, as one of the few cancers that can be literally seen and removed before it becomes cancer, or can be caught early enough in regular screening to be literally cured. Ponder these facts, based on 20 years of experience and summarized by Linda… Read More

Giving Patients a Screening Choice Matters

When patients were offered a choice of colorectal cancer screening with either FOBT or colonoscopy, they were significantly more likely to complete that screening than when their doctors recommended only FOBT or only colonoscopy. Nearly 1000 racially and ethnically diverse patients in urban primary care practices were randomly assigned to get colorectal cancer screening via: Fecal occult… Read More

Patients Not Keeping Up with FOBT Screening

Once is not enough for FOBT! Fecal occult blood test (FOBT) is an effective colorectal cancer screening method, but it needs to be repeated every one or two years to reduce the risk of dying from colon or rectal cancer. But almost half of a group of insured patients initially screened with fecal occult blood testing… Read More

Annual Fecal Occult Blood Test Cost-Effective Screening Option

By: Kate Murphy · August 2, 2010 ·

What’s the best way to get large groups of people screened for colorectal cancer? Surprisingly it may not be colonoscopy but fecal occult blood testing (FOBT). A computer model has found annual home testing with a fecal occult blood test, either Hemoccult II® or Hemoccult SENSA®, is more cost-effective than colonoscopy every 10 years to screen… Read More

Many Doctors Doing Colorectal Cancer Screening Wrong

FOBT screening saves lives, but only when it is done right. Three out of four primary care doctors did a fecal occult blood test once during an office visit, a method that is ineffective in finding cancer or preventing death from colorectal cancer. One out of four used the in-office test exclusively. Less than half of… Read More